No. 12 Arizona 87, Washington 86: Postgame thoughts and observations

Looks like we may have to amend our post earlier this week detailing some of the great Washington-Arizona games in the Lorenzo Romar era.

The Wildcats’ 87-86 thriller of a win over the Huskies at McKale Center on Saturday afternoon just slid into the conversation. If not the No. 1 spot.

Again, we’re not in Tucson, so we’ll pass along the final Associated Press story when it becomes available, then a separate post with some quotes.

For now, as usual for road games, we’ll share some thoughts and observations:

What it means for Washington: Say goodbye to the Pac-10 championship. The Huskies were nearly everyone’s preseason favorite to win the conference, and they fit the bill at times this year. But after that three-game road losing streak, this was their last chance to keep their heads above water in the Pac-10 race. Didn’t happen. It’ll be tough for the Huskies to pull out a second-place finish, too, as they now sit a game behind UCLA with the Bruins facing California on Sunday.

Still, you have to figure Washington did what it needed before a national television audience today – showed it has overcome the troubles that popped up during the WSU-OSU-UO nightmare by hanging tough on the road against the No. 12 team in the country. Nobody watching that game today will say the Huskies aren’t tourney-worthy. And while Husky fans certainly wanted the win, the fact that this was a loss might not mean a ton come Selection Sunday.

What it means for Arizona: UCLA is still in the hunt, but the first-place Wildcats at least eliminated Washington from Pac-10 title contention. And Arizona also took another step closer to an undefeated home season – Oregon and Oregon State are the Wildcats’ only remaining opponents at McKale Center, where they are now 15-0 this season. Game at UCLA next weekend will likely determine the Pac-10 champion.

More observations…

— Derrick Williams just officially ended the Pac-10 Player of the Year conversation. Not only did the win move Arizona one step closer to the conference title, but Williams was phenomenal – 26 points, 11 rebounds and the emphatic blocked shot at the end to ultimately seal the win.

Sure, it looked like it may have been goaltending. But even upon multiple replays, it’s pretty hard to tell – and if we can rewind the tape over and over and over again and still can’t decide whether Darnell Gant’s shot attempt was on its way down when Williams spiked it out of bounds, you really can’t expect an official to make that call. Especially on the road.

Regardless, it seemed the perfect ending to the game for Williams, who had his way inside – and in one of many bizarre statistics from this one, he was not whistled for a single foul.

Williams did have seven of Arizona’s 18 turnovers, but was 8-9 from the free throw line (some star treatment seemed apparent on a few of those trips, but that’s part of the game) and made both of his 3-point attempts.

— An enormous second half for Matthew Bryan-Amaning, who overcame a slow start to finish with 24 points on 12-19 shooting from the field – and somehow took all of those shots in the paint without shooting a single free throw. That’s the perfect illustration of the way this game went, with lots of contact being let go on both ends.

A perfect illustration of the difference between the two big men in this game came on the final sequence. Trailing by one point, the Huskies entered the ball in to Bryan-Amaning with the clock running under 10 seconds. Bryan-Amaning was working 1-on-1 against Williams, then traveled with three seconds left.

And when the Huskies got the ball back after Arizona turned it over trying to inbound it, Williams comes back with the game-winning blocked shot. Poetic, almost. But give Bryan-Amaning credit for taking a lot of contact in this game, finishing through it and keeping his head on straight in an intense atmosphere. He also had nine rebounds, six blocks, four assists and three steals.

— You can’t talk about Bryan-Amaning’s game without mentioning Isaiah Thomas, who set the big man up with easy finishes on three consecutive possessions in the second half. Thomas scored only 12 points but had nine assists, orchestrating a run in the second half that eliminated Arizona’s 49-40 halftime lead.

— C.J. Wilcox did what he needed to with Scott Suggs unavailable, shooting 4-8 from 3-point range to finish with 19 points. Venoy Overton had moderate success as the Huskies’ new starter, scoring six points while handing out four assists and turning the ball over three times.

— Don’t like how reliant the Huskies are on the 3-point shot? You probably enjoyed this game a little more, then. Washington attempted just 16 long balls, making five. Part of that was Thomas’ dribble penetration and UW’s ability to get the ball inside to Bryan-Amaning.

— Thomas looked like he had an open look with about eight seconds left during the game’s final sequence, but kicked it to the wing who entered it into Bryan-Amaning. Interesting decision for the junior guard to pass up the jumper, though Bryan-Amaning had been unstoppable on the block and it certainly wasn’t unwise to think he could get another bucket down there and win the game.

— That last possession and some iffy officiating aside – and that goes for both sides – the Huskies lost this game in the first five minutes when they dug themselves a 15-6 hole. They spent the rest of the game trying to climb out of it. And yeah, they took the lead and forced a down-to-the-wire finish. But you wonder how much different this game could have been had the Huskies come out with the same intensity they possessed for the final 30-35 minutes or so. In the end, this wasn’t a typical road performance, and that’s a good thing. But the beginning was all too familiar.

— Arizona just doesn’t seem to miss 3-pointers at home against the Huskies. The Wildcats made 8-of-11 in the first half, then attempted just seven after halftime and finished 11-18.

— Washington was destroyed on the glass, Arizona holding a 35-22 advantage there. Sixteen of those 35 boards were offensive, too. That, and the 3-point shooting, helped UA win despite the Huskies shooting 54 percent from the field to Arizona’s 44.8 percent.

— Darnell Gant started in place of Aziz N’Diaye because N’Diaye was late for the team bus, according to the ESPN broadcasting crew. Gant scored seven points and grabbed five rebounds.

— The Pac-10 really, really needed this. Even after the game ended, Digger Phelps and the GameDay crew were going on and on dissecting the game’s finish, which is exactly what should happen – that’s standard treatment for a big-time game between two good basketball teams, and that’s exactly what this was. Again, Washington will go home disappointed, and it should. But for once, the Huskies did more to help themselves than they did hurt.